December 09, 2007
Liveblogging The Univision Republican Debate
7:46. Just had to update with this: LOTS of applause in this crowd for a question about Hugo Chavez, Washington's least favorite South American leader. Have no idea what question was posed to Paul w/r/t to Chavez, but his response inspires waves and waves of boos. What just happened here? Tune in tomorrow to find out!
7:28. Well, I got my closed captioning to work -- and the captions are en Espanol. Sorry, readers, but looks like I'm going to have to abort this mission. Truly a first in Gate history.
That said, I am just dumbfounded that the producers would change the format of the Republican debate in such a way that many non-Spanish-speaking Americans would not be able to tune in. There are so many questions about where some of these candidates -- Romney, Giuliani -- really are on immigration reform. That isn't the case in the much more unified Democratic field -- questions about driver's licenses notwithstanding.
We'll have a roundup of reaction to the debate tomorrow. Daily Kos has a Spanish-speaker watching; you can check out their (hotly partisan) liveblog coverage here. The Corner was also stymied in its coverage attempt. Somewhere, Tom Tancredo is doing la cucaracha in front of a TV set.
Apologies again. See you all tomorrow.
7:02. And we're live from Miami. And potentially in a lot of trouble. We were told the Q&A would be in English; now we're being told that the forum will be in Spanish with English subtitles via closed captioning. Do I have closed captioning? Uh-oh. Unless the candidates had a crash course, I assume they will be speaking in English.
6:45. Hola, y bienvenidos a nuestro liveblog con la cobertura del debate de los candidatos Republicanos en Univision.
That's: Hello, and welcome to our liveblog coverage of the Univision Republican presidential candidates debate. Tonight's forum, as you've already guessed, will be held before a Spanish-speaking audience. Questions and answers will be in English with Spanish subtitles, and as with the Democrats' turn in September, participants must respond in English so as not to score extra political points.
Tonight's debate almost didn't happen, and the reason is also why we are covering this after opting not to cover the Democrats' debate. Immigration is a deeply divisive issue for the Republican Party, so much so that it seems these days there are two GOPs instead of one. Univision previously canceled this forum after only John McCain agreed to appear. In November, the network announced it had gotten commitments from the then-front-runners -- Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson and McCain -- and most of the rest -- Mike Huckabee, Ron Paul and Duncan Hunter.
Absent tonight is Tom Tancredo, who hates the idea of bilingual anything, it seems. "It is the law that to become a naturalized citizen of this country you must have knowledge and understanding of English, including a basic ability to read, write, and speak the language," Tancredo said Friday. "So what may I ask are our presidential candidates doing participating in a Spanish-speaking debate? Pandering comes to mind."
Tancredo wittily observed that his rivals were trying to "out-Tancredo" him in a previous forum. We wrote last week that the clash on immigration may be the game-changingly divisive issue of the 2008 election. It'll be interesting to watch tonight how the hardliners -- some recent converts to the cause, it seems -- try to persuade Latinos, the fastest-growing voting bloc in the country, that the GOP is for them. Three years ago, it seemed that President Bush was closing the deal with these voters. Thanks to the impassioned and often ugly battle over immigration reform since then, all his gains may be gone for good.
That is certainly not because all Latinos are for porous borders. Most of the 44 million Latinos in this country followed the rules on the path to citizenship and expect aspiring Americans to do the same. The sometimes hurtful rhetoric in this debate, however, seems to have alienated Latino Americans from the party. And arguments for mass imprisonment and deportation of illegals don't help.
Showtime's at 7 p.m. EST. Gracias to Carin Zissis of the Americas Society/Council of the Americas for the translated welcome.
Photo Illustration: Reuben Dalke
Posted at 7:46 PM
Posted to:
Bush Administration, Campaigns, Duncan Hunter, Fred Thompson, John McCain, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, President Bush, Republicans, Ron Paul, Rudy Giuliani, Tom Tancredo, WH 2008
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